“Yes.” Nora’s tone doesn’t change. I can picture her sitting there, facing her parents without flinching. “Yes, Mom, I did.”

A sharply indrawn breath, then another few beats of silence.

“I told you, Gabs.” It’s Tony who speaks now, his voice weighed down by sadness. “I told you she must’ve. Our daughter’s changed—he’s changed her.”

There’s a scraping noise, like that of a chair moving across the floor, and then a shaky, “Oh, honey.” It’s followed by a choked sob and Nora’s voice murmuring, “Don’t cry, Mom. Please, don’t cry. I’m sorry I’ve disappointed you. I’m so sorry…”

I can’t bear to listen anymore. Jumping off the chaise, I stride out of the library, determined to collect Nora and bring her upstairs. This guilt-tripping is the last thing she needs, and if I have to protect her from her own parents, so be it.

As I walk, I hear them speak again, and I slow down in the hallway, listening despite myself.

“You didn’t disappoint us, honey,” Nora’s father says thickly. “It’s not that, not at all. It’s just that we see now that you’re no longer the same girl… that even if you came back to us, it wouldn’t be the same.”

“No, Dad,” Nora replies quietly. “It wouldn’t be.”

A couple more seconds pass, and then her mother speaks again. “We love you, honey,” she says in a low, strained voice. “Please, don’t ever doubt that we love you.”

“I know, Mom. And I love you, both of you.” Nora’s voice cracks for the first time. “I’m sorry that things have worked out this way, but I belong here now.”

“With him.” Curiously, Gabriela doesn’t sound bitter, just resigned. “Yes, we see that now. He loves you. I never would’ve thought I’d say that, but he does. The way the two of you are together, the way he looks at you…” She lets out a shaky laugh. “Oh, honey, we’d give an arm and a leg for it to be someone else for you. A good man, a kind man, someone who’d hold down a normal job and buy you a house near us—”

“Julian did buy me a house near you,” Nora says, and her mother laughs again, sounding a little hysterical.

“That’s true,” she says when she calms down. “He did, didn’t he?”

Now the two women laugh together, and I let out a relieved breath. Maybe Nora doesn’t need my interference after all.

Another sound of a chair scraping across the floor, and then Tony says gruffly, “We’re here for you, honey. No matter what, we’re always here for you. If anything ever changes, if you ever want to leave him and come home—”

“I won’t, Dad.” The quiet confidence in Nora’s voice warms me, chasing away the remnants of my anger. I’m so pleased that I nearly miss it when she adds softly, “Not unless he wants me to.”

“Oh, he won’t,” Nora’s father says, and he does sound bitter. “That much is obvious. If that man had his way, you’d never be more than ten feet away from him.”